Food- A Balanced Approach

Food: A Balanced Approach

Introduction

(بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ - bismillahir-rahmanir-rahim). As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alhamdulillah we are here today broadcasting from Zaytuna College with Sheikh Hamza Yusuf here with us.

And this particular broadcast is a broadcast of the Lampost Education Initiative and just to give a little bit of a background about what Lampost has been about for some years now. But Lampost largely for the most part is an online and on-site educational initiative and in some ways you can see it as an extension of some of the efforts of Zaytuna and part of the overall a larger mission of sort of indigenizing Islam in America in that we try our best to sort of focus on showcasing certain indigenous scholars and that of course that indigenous doesn't necessarily have to do any particular race but indigenous scholars are people themselves who can better contextualize Islam for the American public. And this month of Ramadan we have been running a series of daily reflections by a number of different of our students of knowledge activists and Muslim scholars who actually are here in the United States.

And we most of those particular talks have been focused on chapters from the Imam Ghazali's Al-Arabeen al-Suludin whereas the presenters would come on and they would summarize particular sections from the actual book and then offer any musings or reflections they may have about it. And today we have chosen actually well I've chosen or actually recommended for Sheikh Hamza to offer his reflections on Imam Ghazali's dissection related to the benefits of hunger being that we're in the month of Ramadan and you know so we want to make sure that people leave this month with some as much as benefit as you can possibly get. So if you have anything to offer please do.

The Importance of Imam Ghazali

(بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ - bismillahir-rahmanir-rahim). First of all, Allah bless all your efforts, Sheikh Hamza Allah. The Al-Arabeen al-Suludin is a very important book I think in a lot of ways because he summarized a lot of the points that he was trying to make in the Ihya.

And one of the things about our community historically is that Imam Ghazali really took the I think the position that somebody like St. Thomas Aquinas had in the Catholic tradition of just somebody who really was seen as the embodiment of orthodoxy. And it's quite tragic that a lot of modern Muslims tend to disparage him from certain segments. The idea that he was a Sufi even though he is a great critic of the Sufis.

The idea that he destroyed philosophy even though he was a great philosopher. The idea that he, so he gets it from a lot of different angles. But for me one of the most important things to remember about Imam Ghazali is he's probably the single most important Usuli scholar in the history of Islam.

I mean obviously Imam Shafi'i was the first to codify the science. But Imam Juwaini who was the great initiator of the Maqasidi school. His student was Imam Ghazali who took it to a whole other level.

And then from him Imam al-Qarafi, Imam al-Shatibi, all the great Maqasidi scholars come out of Imam Ghazali's work. And one of the ironies I think in Saudi Arabia is a lot of these students disparage him. Even the ones that study at some of the universities there.

And yet Ibn al-Qudamah, his Rawdat al-Nadir which is the basis of Hanbali Usul now, that's what they all study, is an abridgement of Imam Ghazali's Musfasfa. So there's an irony in there. But I once asked Sheikh Abdullah bin Baya who I think is arguably probably the greatest Sunni Usuli scholar alive today.

And I think his books establish that fact. But I asked him once if he only had one Usuli book that would, if we lost all of them except for one, what would it be? And he said Musfasfa. There's no question.

There's not even a debate about it. So I thought that was pretty amazing. So this book is a section on sharah al-ta'am which is what we would call gulatni, gula, was one of the deadly sins in Europe in the Catholic tradition.

And gula is the bottom one. It's like midfi at the bottom. And this is where the Muslims put it as well.

It's kind of the base of all the other sins. And that's why it was considered so important to focus on the dangers of it. Because all of the other sins in essence arrive out of it.

The First Sin and the Significance of Food

I mean it's interesting that the first sin of our species is eating. And it's interesting because the Muslims considered, a lot of the Mufassirun considered the forbidden fruit was wheat. It wasn't apple.

It was wheat, which is agriculture. But now we know the harm of wheat and lectins, what they call lectins, which a lot of people are intolerant to. And the Prophet we know never ate wheat.

There's no hadith indicates that he ever ate wheat. He ate barley, which is a very different grain. But anyway.

They called it ta'am. Yeah, ta'am, which is, it's a'ish. It's like yam in Yoruba, I think, or Igbo.

I think it's Yoruba. Yam means to eat. So the yam, which is the potato, West African potato, that's the basis of their a'ish.

Every culture has a'ish. And so khobz is definitely one of the foundational foods. Like in Ireland, it was potatoes for a long time, even though they were actually imported from America.

The Chapter on Hunger and Its Benefits

But the chapter really is about hunger and the benefits of hunger. And we know now, intermittent fasting, there's a lot of science to support the idea of just feeling hungry. So there's books now written.

There's a book written on intermittent fasting by a physician from England. And he suggested Mondays and Thursdays just because he'd heard that the Muslims prefer those days. So he just put it in there.

But he did it from purely a scientific basis. There's also some of the great scholars from the tradition of Tasawwuf, like Abu Madin al-Ghawth, really based his madhhab on hunger. So Abu Madin al-Ghawth, they had the somt, sahr, ju'a, and uzla.

Those were the four. They call that madhhab al-abdal. So being silent, being hungry, and then not sleeping a lot.

And then uzla, being alone, isolation. And because company, you talk, the more you talk, the more trouble you get into. The more you eat, the more trouble you get into.

The more you sleep, you waste your life. So these were all, this is what they call riabah, which is like spiritual exercise. And what's interesting about people is that they'll go to a gym and do all this work to keep their body in shape, but they don't do anything for their heart or their soul.

And if people find out they have a physical heart disease, they'll go to a doctor. They'll find whatever they can. They'll take medicines.

They'll follow the regime. They'll even go into open heart surgery. They'll have them cut open their chest.

But like kibar, they don't even think about the spiritual diseases of the heart, which can be reduced to those seven major ones. Like I actually, as an exercise, took the, there's over 30 diseases in Imam al-Khazali's book.

What's interesting about this chapter is the hadith that he quotes, as reporting that the Prophet said that the very first bid'ah that was introduced was satiation in society.

Food as a Blessing in Context

Yeah, that is very interesting. And partly, I mean we have to also, food was scarce. Like we tend to forget that they were desert Arabs.

Food was scarce. And I think putting hunger in context, also remembering that food is one of the great blessings of Allah. And he said:

That's a reason to worship Allah. Let them worship the Lord of this house, who did this and this. So food and security, which is Maslow's, the base of his pyramid, physiological needs. Although the Prophet put security over those, and I think that's a better pyramid.

Avoiding Excess and Extravagance

But food is a great blessing. And Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala:

The zina, dress well when you go to the masjid, which was encouraged to wear your best clothes. And we used to have the tradition here called Sunday best.

And it always saddens me to see Muslims go to Friday Jummah in t-shirts, which is underwear. In every traditional culture, it's underwear.

And nobody in Morocco, when I first went to Morocco, Jummah, they always dressed up for it. They really wore nice clothes. And people, and then in America, Friday's casual dress day in a lot of companies and things.

So people tend to do that.

But then Allah says:

Eat and drink, but not to excess. Because Allah does not love those who go to excess. And so israf is really prohibited.

But eating, we're commanded in many verses. And even though the command is for nadeb or ibaha, there are many verses where Allah says:

I mean, there are many verses where Allah says, in Surat al-Mulk:

Eat from His sustenance. Yeah, eat from His sustenance.

The Communal Aspect of Eating

So food is a great blessing. And it's also a source of communal experience. It's said that Abdul-Muttalib never ate alone.

And the Arabs don't like to eat alone, generally. Most West Africans are like that. My experience of Africans is they tend really not to.

They see eating alone as something wrong with you. They'd rather not eat than eat alone. North Africans too.

I was trying to make a joke. My wife, she's from North Africa. Yeah.

So eating is a beautiful way for people to come together and enjoy the communal experience. And that's one of the things about Ramadan. It's a great blessing.

The Problem of Gluttony and Constant Grazing

But shara, which is this, with a soft H, shara, is gula. It's where you're nehim. You have a lot of desire for food.

Now sociologists call it grazing. They call them food contacts. So on average, Americans are having like 17 food contacts a day.

Whereas traditionally, in all traditional societies, people ate at fixed times. And they might drink water. They didn't eat.

But now people are always snacking. So they actually called it grazing. It seems appropriate to call it that.

Well, there's a Sahab al-Tasturi. Somebody asked him, what do you say about a man who eats once a day? And he said, akul al-anbiya. It's the way of prophecy.

He said, what about twice a day? He said, akul al-sadiqeen. He said, what about three times a day? He said, build a trough. They're like an animal.

And so now people eat several times a day. And they even encourage this idea of keeping your metabolism up. So you should eat small meals several times a day.

I mean, that's so... I'm sorry. I don't buy that. Because it's so anti-fitrah to do that.

Practical Advice for Developing Food Discipline

I'm wondering, well, not just wondering, but I know that there are a lot of people who are out there who struggle with... Food? With food. Struggle with sort of just developing a discipline. You're having the right diet and things like that.

Well, Imam al-Ghazali gives good advice. Because he says that you should do it with tadreef. Like, just do it slowly.

Don't try to... You know what, the problem with dieting is people stop and do everything at once. He says, just take one luqmah, one extra morsel, and just don't eat it. If you're eating two pieces of toast in the morning, start eating one piece of toast.

You know, just do it slowly. The most important thing to me about diet, and I've studied it a lot, and it's been interesting. I grew up... My mother was very involved in a natural diet from early on.

So I grew up with that whole movement in the 60s. She was an early on-setter for that. But the most important thing is to eat good food.

If you can afford it. It's better to spend more money on good food and eat less of it than on cheap food and eat a lot of it. Because if you eat good food, you need less.

The Crisis of Malnutrition from Poor Quality Food

And one of the things about... A lot of people are suffering in America from malnutrition because they eat such bad food. So their cells are actually malnourished. So they're hungry all the time.

It's not because they're not eating enough. It's because they're not eating enough of the right food. So if you eat good food, you're going to eat less.

My wife's here, so she'll testify to this. But I have, for years, only had two meals a day. I could not eat three meals a day.

I would just feel sick. And so I eat in the morning and then in the evening. And it's better to eat early if you can.

Right now it's Ramadan, so we're eating late. But 80% of our health problems in the United States are directly related to diet. And so diet was very important in the Islamic tradition.

What Allah Has Prohibited in Food

Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala... I mean, one of the things... Imam Malik, as you know, because you're a maliki, Imam Malik took... There's only a few verses about what's haram. You've got baqarah, ma'ida, and then an'am, I think, is the only other one. It's all in... The cow, and then the table spread, and then an'am.

So they're in the appropriate named verses. But it's very simple what Allah has prohibited. You know:

And then:

So if you're in dire need, then you can eat what's not food. But there it's just carrion, dead meat, which unfortunately most of the meat here, because they stun them, and you know in the other verse:

Yeah. Because... Yeah, it's... The bihi is after... So the munkhaniqatu is prohibited, which is strangulation, which they do that with some animals now. And the mawqudatu is... Ibn al-'Arabi, in his tafsir, actually mentions the bunduq, the qaws al-bunduq, which is a gun, basically.

So a stun gun, anything like that is mawquda. The mutaraddiya, like they fall off a cliff or something. And then the natiha, the gouge by another animal.

And then ma'akra al-sab'u. Yeah, and then ma'akra al-sab'u. So Allah doesn't prohibit very many things in the Quran.

The Importance of Tayyibat - Pure and Good Food

And then:

They ask you what's permissible for them. And he's... Yeah. So the tayyibat are permitted.

And so... You know, there's verses, eat good, and whenever it's talking about food, it has tayyib with it. Now, obviously, the dominant meaning for the fuqaha was always the source. Right.

But I don't... I think, you know... And that... So it's the general statement. And obviously, there's a hadith of Mu'adh ibn Jabal, when he said to... The Prophet was talking about, if your food's pure, your prayer will be answered. And Mu'adh said:

And he said, You know, make your food pure, that you will have your prayers answered.

So that's obviously financially, like where your money's from, and where the source is. And I know for a fact, that one of the great salihin of our age, Muhammad Zakariya, who I met... Did you ever meet him in Medina? He was over 100. He was about 110 when I met him.

I've heard you speak about him a number of times. He was amazing, man. He was from Bukhara.

But he... His waraq, you know, his scrupulousness, he would only buy from the butchers that he knew prayed five prayers in the masjid. You know, like... They were really scrupulous about... And he was so scrupulous about his food, but he had incredible energy for ibadah. And that's one of the things, is that the exhaustion comes from food that's not halal.

And there are many:

So, eat from the good things, and do good things. So, the energy to do good things comes from the tayyibat.

And it's an important part of this, because we're talking about the benefits of hunger, and one of the benefits he lists is that it helps you have a clear mind, because of the stomach being empty, and so people feel heavy.

The Arabs say:

A pouch will remove... Your intelligence. So, yeah, filling the stomach. I think it's really important for people just to have this concern about eating the right type of things.

The Path of the Spiritual Practitioners

I think for me, look, there's two things I would say. One, hunger... Remember, these people were really like monks that got married. I mean, when you read these books, people have to remember, these were serious practitioners that were also engaged actively in what some would call like a path of sanctification.

They're on the path of the saint. They really want to have wusul to God. Not everybody's that, and I don't like to preach that.

I've seen some people do that, and I think it's unfair to a lot of people, because there's a baseline. And that's why, you know, this religion is not about hunger. You know, hunger's beneficial, but if you're eating halal food, if you know it's halal, if you're a carpenter, and your work is halal, and you're doing something, really it's halal, and you buy that food, and it's halal, eat as much as you want.

I mean, that's the reality of it. The problem is the shubuhat in food now. And then also we have all the... I mean, I'm not saying that.

That's hyperbole. I hope people get that. But, you know, in other words, it's more important to eat food that's halal, in the real meaning of that word, halal and tayyib, than to deprive yourself of food, and then eat food that has shubhah in it when you do eat.

The Benefits of Periodic Fasting and Cleansing

So that's really important. But undeniably, and I tend to, during the year, I'll take like 10 days and just go on water or juice. So I've done that regularly for years.

And I actually really, I've always benefited from that. So I don't, that's not really a spiritual fast, although it has spiritual benefits. It's more just cleaning the body.

And we know that the Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم) used Senna twice a year. It's in the Sahih al-Bukhari. So he actually cleaned his bowels by just completely getting rid of all the excess.

Because, yeah, we tend to carry excess food. And Sayyidina Ali's famous statement:

Don't make your stomachs graveyards for animals by eating meat.

The Crisis of Meat Consumption and Ocean Depletion

And what's interesting to me also, because that's another problem. For me, meat consumption is a big problem.

And I would argue now, ethically, that eating fish, unless it's fish that is... It's farm fish.

Not farm fish, but the wild fish. The wild fish is... No, farm fish. Farm fish? Yeah, because hopefully... I thought it was the opposite.

No, it's the opposite. Farm fish is not... Because what's happening, the wilds, they're all disappearing. Like we're probably between 85% to 95% of complete collapse in the ocean.

I have a book called Bloom, which is about the takeover of the jellyfish. They're taking over the ocean because all the fish are dying. And so the jellyfish are thriving, which is amazing for me because the jellyfish is a spineless consumer.

So that's what's thriving. Like the sharks and the swordfish and the whales. All those amazing creatures are disappearing.

The spineless consumer, which is still amazing. I mean, jellyfish are amazing. I've been stung by jellyfish.

I know how amazing they are. So we have a crisis. And then meat.

The Unethical Treatment of Animals

The way meat is raised is totally unethical. And if you want to see one of the most troubling films... I actually could not watch the whole thing. But there's a film called Earthlings, which is about just the cruelty to animals.

And I could not watch. I had to turn it off because it was just so deeply troubling to me. What we do to animals is so wrong because animals are sentient beings.

And they have a right to be treated well, even when they're sacrificed to the Prophet. One of my favorite hadiths of all the hadiths is that Allah:

(Sahih Muslim 1955)

He decreed excellence, beauty, virtue in everything. But then... And it really threw me off for a long time. And I never saw this in any commentaries.

But I wondered why he went to... Why would he go to zabah as his analogy? And I realized that it was... He was taking the ugliest thing in the world and saying in that thing there still has to be beauty. And how do you do it? By doing it well. Having a sharp knife.

Give repose, solace to this poor creature. And he once saw a man sacrifice an animal in front of another animal.

And he said, why did you sacrifice that twice? Because that animal sees that and it feels.

It has sentience. Exactly. So that's really important to lessen meat.

Meat in the Prophetic Tradition

And what struck me about the Muwatta because obviously the Hadith in Al-Bukhari, Al-Ta'an, that meat is the Sayyid of food. It's the master. But the Sayyid, you only go to them when you need it.

You don't want to go to the Sayyid all the time. In Baqar, that Hadith is... But in the Hadith in the Muwatta, he says, he saw Jabir ibn Abdullah and he had Himalu Lahman with him. And he said, what's this? And he said, for the Arab people out there, the interest in Arabic, it's specifically when you desire meat.

So Qarim in Arabic is somebody who likes meat. Because not everybody likes meat. Some people.

The Permissibility of Vegetarianism in Islam

And in fact, you can be a vegetarian because it's Sunnah to be vegetarian, believe it or not. It's Sunnah by Iqrar. Because the Sunnah, right, is Aqwal.

They're prioritized over any other Sunnah. Aqwal and then Af'al. Statements, actions.

And then the... Authorizations. Authorizations. And there is one Sahabi who was a vegetarian.

Abul Lahman. Yeah, Abul Lahman. Abdullah ibn Abdul Malik.

There's different versions of his name. But his laqab was Abul Lahman. And he asked the Prophet, he said, I didn't like to eat meat.

And the Prophet aqarrahu alayhi. So, but you can't do it ta'abudan. That's where the ulama would differ.

You can't do it as an act of devotion. Because the Sunnah, the Prophet's personal Sunnah is to eat meat. But by today's standards, he would be considered a semi-vegetarian.

Because he ate very little meat. And one of the interesting things now is that the Eid, the whole purpose of the Eid al-Adha was to give poor people meat. Because, like in India, fool, what they call adas, you know, the lentils, daal.

Daal is the meat of the poor people. And in Sudan, it was the fool of Sudan eat peanuts. Like in West Africa, all the poor people eat peanuts as their source of protein.

Sayyidina Umar's Concern About Meat Consumption

And so, we forget, like eggs is a really good source of protein. But eating a lot of meat is dangerous. So when Omar saw him, he said:

And he said, in one riwayah, he says, akullu mashtahayt ashtarayt. Every time you get hungry for meat, you buy it. Because he said he bought a dirham's worth, which would have been a lot.

And then he said:

Right? Like, you eat less, so your brother can eat more? Right, right. Because one of the things about the planet... It's like food for your stomach. Yeah, no, but exactly.

Global Inequality in Food Distribution

One of the things about the planet now is that you have such a disparity. Like you have people, I had one of my sheikhs said, inni ta'jibtu min qawmin ya'umuhu dinu ta'awni wal ikha alladhi wajaba. fa ba'duhum mayyitun ju'an wa ba'duhum min tukhmatin mayyitun wa mayyitun taraba.

He said, I'm amazed at the people who they share a religion of brotherhood, and yet some are dying of overeating and others are dying of starvation. And this is one of the mad things about our planet, is you have people literally dying of diseases of overeating, and you have people right now in Yemen. I mean Yemen is threatened by famine.

Right? We've got famine in Syria in place. We have many areas in Africa right now. Somalia is in a real crisis.

Eritrea is in a crisis. So these are things for us to think about. And I try to remind my kids before we eat, this is a great blessing.

There's people that don't have this blessing. Which is one of the purposes of Ramadan, is to experience hunger. And that's one of the benefits of it.

The Natural Human Inclination Toward Meat

What's interesting is that before I came here, I was at my dentist, and they had a program on the TV screen at the moment, and they were showing these Philly cheesesteaks. And I was like, I looked at my daughter, I looked at my wife, and we were like, oh my god, Philly cheesesteaks are on the TV. And of course naturally, I mean we like meat.

You're from Philly. Yeah, I'm from Philly. So we love some cheesesteaks, and it's hard to find... We are hoagies, right? Hoagies, but the authentic cheesesteaks, you have to get them from Philadelphia.

But naturally, we incline towards meat, and people eat meat, and people love meat. And I'm certain that there are some people, okay, well yeah, I know what I need to, I know that that's probably what I should do. But is there really truly benefit to actually being hungry? You understand? Well, there's a benefit, undeniably.

The Environmental Crisis of Beef Production

And just to conclude about meat, Seyda Omar prohibited meat two days in a row in Medina when he was kid. So he was very concerned about the overconsumption of meat. And we know now that cows are one of the major problems on the planet.

So much of the wheat, it takes seven pounds of grain to make one pound of meat. And so, Jeremy Rifkin wrote a book, Beyond Beef, about the crisis, that we need to stop eating beef. And again, the Prophet never ate beef, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.

Although it is in the Quran, Marab Tarhaj told me, when I asked him about that, he said, Ibrahim gave a veal, which is a choice. People who know beef, they know that veal is, that's really good meat. So it is permissible.

But in the context of a feast, or honoring someone. Yeah, exactly. That's generally how it is.

But to eat meat, like several times a week, or three times a day, some people eat it three times a day, which is crazy. So it's not good for you. Imam Asawi mentions that a woman of stature the husband has to provide three times a week.

So that was a wealthy woman. Anyway, hunger is definitely an important thing, spiritually, traditionally. Fasting was a practice.

The Practice of Consistent Fasting

If you're going to fast extra, I would recommend the three white days. That's what Malik did, that's really the Prophet's practice. One of the things about the Sahaba, one of the things about the Prophet, is that his Sahaba, whenever they took on a practice, they maintained it their whole life.

We kind of dip in and out, do things every once in a while. So it's always better to do a little, but the best of actions are continuous, even if they're smaller amounts. So the same is true for food.

I think just make it a practice to go without food. Imam Al-Ghazali recommends every once in a while, feeding your children something really simple, like just bread or rice, without anything else. So they know that these things, be tough on yourselves, because blessings don't always last.

The Importance of Gratitude for Food

But the important thing, I think of all things, is to be grateful for what you have. And the Prophet, he said that, Allah is pleased that you eat, as long as you thank Him for it. And so it's very important to begin, Bismillah, and the Qur'an reminds us both:

Don't eat other than what you've named Allah on. So to begin, Bismillah, is very important, because the shayateen eat with you, if you don't. And they get strong. The famous hadith, it's a numerous hadith, but it's an

interesting hadith.

And then the other is that, when you finish the food, always praise Allah:

Making those duas are really important:

That's what I always do with my boys, before we eat. And then I always make a dua for the person who cooked, which is usually my wife. Just to remind them also, that it's a great blessing to be served. That's a good point.

Questions About Halal Meat and Stunning

Teachers teach a lot of this. A question. David mentioned and asked, I think Sheikh touched on it in terms of stunning the chicken, where at times the chicken can die, what is the opinion on this? Is this allowed to eat or best avoided? And also he asked, how many times a week, is there a recommended time of how much meat you should eat per week according to the sunnah or science?

If you go by the sunnah, the Prophet ate meat quite rarely, but partly it was because meat was wealth, like livestock is wealth in traditional cultures. So you don't sacrifice unless you have a guest or something like that.

In Mauritania, where I lived in Mauritania, they always loved the guest because they would sacrifice. But even the Mauritanians that I lived with, traditionally they just sprinkled a little bit of meat.

It's like the Chinese. The Chinese just add a little bit for taste, but they don't eat a lot of meat. Like we eat this huge. You'll have these people that eat this pound steak. It's amazing how they can consume that much meat.

Like Moroccans, they put the meat right in the middle of the couscous.

You have to dig in there. So I think that depends on, I mean obviously it's halal, and we can't tell anybody not to eat. It's very important that these things, a lot of these things are by choice.

As long as it's halal and you can afford it, it's permitted to eat it unless it's going to harm your health. And that's why we shouldn't forget that. We're not trying to deprive people of the blessings that Allah has given them.

But what's good for you, we know that eating a lot of meat is not good for you. Our theory of sclerosis comes from it. So I personally, I mean I'm semi-vegetarian, and I don't like to eat meat that's not organic and free- range.

Even the eggs I eat are free-range. These are luxuries. I'm very well aware of that. A lot of people can't afford.

Well it's interesting, Ibrahim, you made a statement to someone who came to him complaining about the high prices. Supply and demand.

That's Sufi economics. Cheapening it with hunger. Yeah, Sufi economics. Because he just told him, don't eat it, and the price will go down. Because it's supply and demand. That's a good point.

Raising Your Own Food

But you know, if you can, if you're able to raise chickens, that's a blessing. Because they really provide for you, and they're easy maintenance. But that was also a question related to stunning the chicken and the chicken dies.

Yeah, I mean look, a lot of meat now, they stun it first before they slaughter it. It's definitely a shubha in that. But I think the person actually said that they stun it and the chicken actually dies before. No, that's prohibited. You can't eat that. Yeah, you can't eat that.

Although, this is a khilaf. Qadi Abu Bakr ibn al-Arabi, this was a khilaf in the Andalusians. Because:

It's a fatal, that issue. So the food of the people of the book is halal for you. If you're going to eat that, I would eat free range organic kosher before I eat any Christian meat.

I think the idea that Safeway is Christian or any of these things, it's very doubtful. And then remember, a lot of the meat is in the same places where there's pork. And a lot of, they don't clean, they'll just grind the meat from the same, so they'll do pork and then they'll do beef and things.

So they found horse meat in Safeway meat. The only one I would trust is the kosher meat. I think they have very rigorous, especially the more organic free range.

But again, a lot of people don't want to support because some of it will end up supporting maybe Israel or something like that. So there's people that have issues with that. Yeah, it's a big problem.

So the best thing is, I think our Muslim community needs to be more vigilant about supporting halal. But I would really prefer if they do free range, treat the animals humanely. Because I personally think eating a lot of the animals is just not, it's unethical now.

Just the way they're killed and raised. I mean, I've seen how they raise modern animals. My grandfather had a cattle ranch. So I spent summers on a cattle ranch. And he really cared about animals. It was a very different world.

Now it's just what they do. They feed them other animals now. Which is crazy, that's how they got mad cow disease and things.

Sheikh's Personal Diet Routine

Are there any other questions there? Those are the two main ones. There's a lot of people asking about Sheikh's personal diet routine. I think he's actually mentioned it. Expressively or articulately. I don't eat that much. I gain

weight very easily.

It's just genes. I don't eat very much. But I do try to eat really good food. I don't eat sugar. I was very disciplined for years and I kind of went off the wagon and got lax on sweets. But I've kind of returned to I'm much more rigorous about it.

I was actually surprised a couple years ago when we were in Abu Dhabi you pulled out a candy bar. First time I ever saw you with a candy bar. You gave most of it away. What kind of candy? Chocolate. It was fair trade. Fair trade chocolate.

He's exposing me now. I've never seen him eat cake. I don't eat cake. Ice cream, nothing. I like ice cream. Good ice cream, but rare.

The only thing that I can't resist is the asabi. You know those little halwani? Like the baklava type. Those things, if they're fresh I keep the bowl away from me. I'll just expose myself. I'm very disciplined on that. I eat fruit every morning.

I'm pretty... I try just to stay healthy. Alhamdulillah, that's great.

Avoiding Fad Diets

I'm against any fad diets. I really think it's dangerous. I think veganism is anti-fitrah. Every civilization ate meat.

There are very few civilizations even the Hindus a lot of them are vegetarian. That's a religious... comes out of their religion. But even Buddhists traditionally ate meat.

They usually had Muslims kill it because they couldn't kill it. But if the Muslims killed it, they could eat it. The vegetarians are vegans. Are they vegans as well? They're not vegans. I really think fad diets are very dangerous personally. I've seen people really get sick from fad diets.

I know that a lot of the principles of veganism are very sound. Like having a lot more vegetables. But some vegans are very... It just depends on what type.

The Importance of Balance and Your Genetic Background

I think there should be vegetables and fruit. The paleo diet is... I think a lot of it depends on where you are genetically from where you're from and what type of diet. I think there's a lot of truth to that.

It depends. Some people... My wife's from a Native American background so they don't do well with carbohydrates. Corn is the natural maize and things like that.

But wheat and things like that are not good for them. That's why they have such high rates of obesity and diabetes. Native Americans really suffer from modern diet.

Food Co-ops and Community Solutions

When I was growing up, they had food co-ops where people got together so they could buy bulk food. This was something that I think needs to happen in places where poor people are, where they can really eat better food by cooperating together. I agree with that.

Of course, because I come from... I wouldn't necessarily say I come from poverty. There's some degree of poverty that I do come from, but I definitely live amongst people who are poor, who have been poor, but at the same time people just simply think they're poor. Well, poverty in America.

My immediate family, because I grew up with my mother, we would be considered poor. There was a lot of wealth in the family. My grandfather was extremely wealthy. My father's family was very wealthy. But my immediate... We got one pair of shoes for the whole year. Remember those tennis shoes? By the end of the year, you wrap them with the duct tape.

We used to have Bobos. No, we had Converse. Converse, yeah. They're back out. They're back in style. You know, but... There was a question.

Coffee and Caffeine Consumption

This part of the discussion is actually a bunch of quips. There's three people asking specifically about advice or thoughts on consumption of coffee and caffeine in particular. Especially in Ramadan, there's a lot of caffeine withdrawal. There's three people asking thoughts on it.

I gave up caffeine during Ramadan. I drink tea without sugar. I think green tea's better for people. These are blessings. I think coffee's a blessing.

Again, in moderation. You shouldn't have a lot of caffeine. It's not good for you. The Yemenis call coffee the wine of the believers. We're not Mormons. So, tea and coffee are fine, but again, it's moderation.

And the worst thing is the sugar in it. One of the nice things about Arabian coffee, which I really love, the coffee they drink in Saudi Arabia. They have it with dates. It's really nice. There's no sugar. 100 grams of dates do not raise blood sugar.

Dates are amazing. If you have a sweet tooth, have a few dates. It really takes care of the sugar craving.

Alternatives for Those with Limited Options

I was going to say before, when I was talking about the issue of poor people, is that... I just wanted to go back there for a quick second. I just think that it's important for people, while they're given these very limited options, oftentimes, that it is important for people to understand that there are other alternatives that do exist. If they really search for them, they'll find them.

So that people don't feel that, okay, I might as well continue to not have discipline and just eat whatever I want to eat. When I go back to Philadelphia, when I go back home, I notice things in people's skin, the skin color. They don't look well.

You can see it right away when you look at people. I'm quite sure you've noticed this as well. I attribute it to this bad diet. A lot of it is bad diet. Also, people can grow food. If you have a backyard, even now there's what they call urban homesteading.

If you google that, there's a whole movement of just what you can do in your house and on your porch. There's a lot of things. You can do sprouts, which are very good. Those are easy to make in the house. There's just a lot of things that people can do. Again, you don't have to eat a lot of food.

The Simple Diet of the Prophet

You know, luqaymat. You don't need a lot of food. You don't need a lot of food. The Prophet lived, Aisha r.a, they asked her because they didn't see fire come out of the chimney of the house for two months. They said, what did you eat? She said:

which is dates and water. One of the amazing things about dates is the Prophet said:

(Sahih Muslim 2046)

A house with dates will never be hungry. Dates have all the amino acids. They're incredible food. So, there's simple foods that you can eat that you don't need a lot of.

The Benefits of Polyphenol-Rich Foods

The polyphenols are very important. Those tend to be more expensive. When I was a kid, we used to go and pick blackberries because there were a lot of blackberry bushes around where we were.

But berries are incredibly rich. They lower cholesterol. But unfortunately, they're expensive. And then organic, you're going to another level. But if people can afford those things, they're really good to eat those polyphenol-rich foods.

Actually, I don't want to keep Sheikh Hamza for too long because he just had a session. Any more questions? I know he's going to say that, but just to respect your time as well. I love you, brother. Maybe if you want to take one more.

The Problem of Fast Food

Brother Khan Faisal asks, what is your view on tackling the fast food which seems to be available on every street corner? It seems like there are not many alternatives. Also, I hope to see Sheikh again in the UK.

I am totally against fast food. I really am. I just think fast food is like the worst thing for people. And like I said, many people are malnourished because they're eating processed foods.

And this all came out of World War II. One of the horrible consequences of World War II is that because they needed to feed these vast armies, they had to process food. And so they developed techniques of preserving food for much longer periods of time.

But when the war ended, they realized, hey, you know, it's much better, so let's can all this food, because food, it's just much cheaper for them. And so again, it's the profit motive. They probably had a surplus, too.

Sugar and Its Connection to Disease

So now, so many people are eating all this processed food with high salt content. If you look, sugar is in everything. And if you want to read something very interesting, Otto Frank, who was nominated for Nobel Prize over 40 times and won the Nobel Prize for Microbiology, he was a Jewish physician who Hitler never killed because Hitler set him up in a laboratory in Germany and he worked solely on the cancer problem between, I think, 1934 to 1945.

That's all he did. And he determined that cancer cells, he actually believed that all disease was cellular malfunction, and he basically said that cancer cells only, their only source of nutrition is fermented sugar. So cancer thrives on fermented sugar, which is why alkaline based diets are very, they're much more beneficial.

Teeth caries come from acidic mouth environment. And so the more sugar you eat, the more acidic. And sugar, remember, rice is sugar, bread is sugar.

People forget that these are complex sugars as opposed to simple sugars. So teeth are meant to last a lifetime. And civilization ruins teeth.

Dental Health and Traditional Practices

A lot of dentists ruin teeth too because there's so many bad dentists out there. I mean, there's good dentists, but there are a lot of dentists that are very aggressive with their dentistry. But if you look at jaws from like 300,000 years ago, all the teeth are intact.

Right, exactly. No plaque on the teeth. No plaque on the teeth.

But the SIWAK is really good too, because the SIWAK is amazing. I mean, it really does have amazing benefits. And then oil pulling, if people, I would really recommend taking care of your teeth.

Oil pulling is very good. If you Google that, using like any oil can be used, but a good oil is coconut oil, where you just swish oil in your mouth for a few minutes, like five, ten minutes. It draws all the bacteria out, and it's an Ayurvedic tradition.

But people that practice it, they have their teeth their whole life. And then rinsing immediately after food is sunnah. People forget that.

Because cavities, dental caries occur after about 20 minutes. The bacteria begins to thrive if you don't rinse your mouth. But if you rinse your mouth well after a meal, you won't get dental caries.

And then there's a hadith that the angels are troubled by food between the teeth of somebody praying:

And Imam Ibn Abi Zayd, you know this book, in the Risalah:

is a sunnah. The Prophet used palm fiber, so he flossed his teeth. And he had beautiful teeth, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, and he took very good care of them. Somebody tried to count how many times he brushed during the day, and he gave up.

Because he would use the siwak constantly. So, is that it?

Curry, Spices, and Supplements

The last question was, it's kind of a funny one, but what does Sheikh Hamza think of curries and having it every day? Because Bangladesh and others, we have it every day, and probably couldn't do without it. And then lastly, any thoughts on supplements?

I think curry, turmeric is a miracle spice. I mean, it's anti-inflammatory, it's anti-cancer. So, I think curry, most places that have very hot climates use heavy spice. And I actually always thought that the reason was to protect from bacteria and things like that.

And I think there's been some research on that that's proven that. So, I don't think, I think probably the worst thing is the oil. It's not so much the spices.

Although, in Hinduism, in the Ayurvedic tradition, the sunyasa period, which is the later period, they give up what they call rajas food, which is spicy food. So, as you get older, like 50 and beyond, in the Ayurvedic

tradition, you're supposed to not eat that, because that's very stimulating food. And one of the things about food is that it really does strengthen the appetites and the shahalats.

People should be balanced on all those things, because if you go to any extremes, it's a way of dissipating your life's energy and things that could be directed towards higher things.

Final Words: The Prophetic Example of Moderation

Okay, so, I mean, any final words before we... You know, I would just say, you know, again, food is a great blessing, but moderation. The Prophet, there's so many verses in the Quran about moderation.

You know:

We made you a middle nation. I mean, there's so many verses about moderation and balance. And so, balance is really important.

Don't go to extremes. I think it's really dangerous. The Sufis historically very often went to extremes, and a lot of these books have that aspect of tasawwuf, which I think is dangerous.

The Prophet was very balanced, and he liked moderation. He really was the most balanced human being that ever lived. He was balanced in his temperament, he was balanced in his eating, everything.

He was just beautifully balanced. Even his hair was wavy, you know, it wasn't real curly, and it wasn't straight. He was of middle stature, you know, everything.

His color, it wasn't pasty white, it wasn't dark, everything. He was just middle in everything. And so, which is not to say anything about those extremes or just Allah's creation.

But he really was just middle in everything, even physically. So, I think just be balanced. Don't go to extremes.

I hope I didn't offend any vegans. People get angry. Why is he saying anything about vegans? Or is it veganism is not a fad diet? I didn't mean to offend anybody.

I know everybody is hypersensitive these days. But these are, in the end, I hope they're not just opinions. I hope they're based on something. I mean, I try to base things on study and thinking and the book and the sunnah, obviously. But also just reason. Just being reasonable.

Because I think our religion is a very reasonable religion.

Closing Dua and Blessings

But may Allah bless your Ramadan. May Allah bless Dr. Abdullah for all the work that he does. I really consider him one of the really important he's not so young anymore, but he's still young. But one of the important young leaders, intellectual leaders in our community. So may Allah increase him and bless him.

May Allah bless all of you in your Ramadan. This is hopefully the night of power. May Allah give us the benefit of this night.

May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala give us the benefit of our fasting and our prayers. May He forgive us our shortcomings also. We're weak and we admit that.

May He, inshallah, the little that we do, may it be a lot in God's in His scales, inshallah. So, that's it. Inshallah.

We'd like to thank Sheikh Hamza and hopefully we see you all another time. Assalamu alaikum. Wa alaikum assalam.